You know what I’m talking about.
High-rolling, big-balling, I-have-so-much-money-that-I-use-a-$20-to-light-my-cigar kind of club.
Nothing to do with strippers. I think.
This is an older story from our conversations that I don’t think I’ve recounted on this blog yet.
So how does it go?
He was recruited (?) because he is now doing this MBA refresher course thing, and he is starting to network with people in the crew.
Someone or another, introduced The Idiot to the club as a potential candidate.
As he was explaining how he was recruited, BF’s mouth kept twitching in the most peculiar way.
Basically, the founders of the club called The Idiot, and met him at a fancy restaurant, where they plied him with drinks and fancy food.
Over lunch, they explained that the club cost $5000 a month (which means $60,000 a year), and they will meet occasionally just like this, in restaurants and private clubs to discuss business.
The Idiot said he was really excited.
And that he felt like this was a real once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, but ultimately, $5000 was a lot of money.
He considered that it could be seen as a way to sell his wife’s photographs.
Oh yeah.
We love that part…
The founders were enthusiastic when they heard The Idiot Wife was a “professional” photographer.
They said: “Set up a show and we’ll come take a look”.
And he got extremely excited about that, assuming that they would DEFINITELY buy something, as they are his friends.
Yes.
He wanted to join a $5000 a month club, just to sell his wife’s crappy, blurry photographs.
You may think I’m being harsh, but I am being realistic, in assessing her as a person who could be someone I’d be inspired to buy a print from.
Those photographs were worse than what I could have taken with my Canon camera.
A lot of them came out blurry, with red-eye and the composition was horribly cliche. You could find a lot better on Flickr.
If she was a fabulous photographer, her work would speak for herself.
But since she got a degree from Mexico in Photography, she thinks she’s National Geographic.
Near the end, The Idiot was worried he’d have to actually pay for the $70 meal that he ate, but said he felt relieved and lucky that they told him “Nonsense, we’re picking up the bill.”
Then he felt anxious after, because he felt like he had to return the favour and take THEM out to dinner and pay for THEIR meals.
In the end, he didn’t sign up for the club (big surprise).
But BF speculated that if it was $1000-a-month, he may have considered it.
To which I gagged.
And then he said his wife was looking into renting a gallery and showing off her photographs, to sell them at $1000/print.
That.. is another story, for another day.
I asked BF why he was smiling so strangely during the conversation.
He explained to me later that these gentleman’s clubs are quite common in Europe, and he was even part of one (!!!) but:
- BF’s company paid the yearly fee because it was crazy expensive
- It was really exclusive, as in you couldn’t just be recruited, you had to be vetted
- It was also for business talk most of the time, to get new clients for the company
He said that NO ONE paid for their own membership, which is why the fees are $5000/month or more, as the COMPANY is the one paying for it.
And NO ONE would ever just recruit a random MBA Refresher Student, because they want to keep the club exclusive.
They also don’t take people who aren’t part of a company and working.
(FYI: The Idiot was still unemployed when they asked, and they knew it)
He said that right away, he understood that the founders were crooks, looking to take some money from gullible “businessmen” by flattering them with an invitation to this exclusive club.
And he couldn’t blame them.
Don’t worry, we told The Idiot all of the above in a tactful manner, but ultimately, he didn’t want to join for $60,000/year, so whatever we said to him was moot.
Just a girl trying to find a balance between being a Shopaholic and a Saver.
I cleared $60,000 in 18 months earning $65,000 gross/year.
Now I am self-employed, and you can read more about 
I do agree that this story is an example of person with just no clue about money, but honestly, reading this left me with a really bad taste in my mouth. I can't even imagine how I would feel if my "friends" were writing something like this about me. Presumably, "the idiot" is your husband's friend and that is why you associate with him. Why do you even bother associating with him? Clearly, he's not a valuable friend to your husband if he lets you write about him like this on the internet.
Otherwise I love your blog. I just had to chime in as this was bothering me all day yesterday.
Completely agree, Sarah.
Yeah, right away I thought it was a scam too, but really I think @Last Born Child had it right in calling it a pyramid scheme.
"Gentleman’s Club" of the non-stripper type, sounds very elitist and pompous… somewhat old school?
If you get time, do a writeup on it, I'm sure your readers would appreciate being introduced to such a hidden high flying club(s)…
It is definitely elitist, pompous and old school.
I mean, only MEN are allowed!!!!
I’ll ask BF to give me a quick rundown of what they do there. 🙂
Wow–that is really, really wild. It's kind of creepy that people would fall for something like that–but clearly they do. Incidentally, where in Europe is your husband from? We've never heard of such at thing here in France, but then again, we're not exactly hanging out with movers and shakers.
Wow. Now I'm a pretty gullible person but even I can see scam written all over this. In fact, it sounds like an amateur pyramid scheme.
Some elite societies do serve a purpose but the scales are usually evenly balanced i.e. there has to be something in it for either side. Did your friend even consider what tangible benefits he would be receiving for $60,000 a year?
Wow.
"If it sounds too good to be true, then it probably is"
Oh.My.Word.
Wow, the idiot is really an idiot. The fact that someone would even consider paying for such an elitist membership says a lot about where he gets his self worth.
Well, at least he DIDN'T do it. Although… Eeep. $5,000 to join a club? MONTHLY?
And here I'm wondering whether or not to keep my gym membership for $28.50/month. ^__^;
$60,000 a year. My heart just stopped beating. I live my dream life on $32,000 a year. I can't even imagine throwing away twice that for the sake of my ego.